Technology Innovation at SAPPHIRE NOW – SAP HANA

In my second post of my pre SAPPHIRE NOW blog series I’d like to have a closer look on the agenda with you. Given the vast spectrum of technologies being show-cased and test-driven at the Technology Innovation Campus (please refer to my previous blog post for more details) it sounds like a good idea to serve it in more digestible doses and slice it into smaller pieces.

So, why not start off with the obvious topics first and get those out of the way and then look for the runner-ups that did not (yet) get the same attention?

OK, so… ladies first: SAP HANA. Not sure about calling her a lady and if this is the best fitting description as she seems to be too young to deserve being called a lady yet. She certainly acts like a Diva already, yet – and please excuse the corny metaphor – I think if you’d want to attribute her with a female stereotype then “Lolita” may sounds the most appropriate. Young of age, yet already turning heads everywhere. Everybody knowing… once she matured she’ll become a star!

Here, I see another parallel between the music and the enterprise software industry (the other one being the application store in the cloud.) Promising starlets are hyped in order to meet public expectations and being put on stage without ever having the proper time to learn how to cope with all the pressure and exposure. Consequently, taking it step-by-step sounds very reasonable – especially when considering the potential of our particular candidate.

So, what is up with SAP HANA? Is it real?

We at SAP certainly know it is, yet we also know that SAP HANA does still have a long way to go to the high expectations her gene pool is promising. While we have a steadily growing number of scenarios underlining our statements and vision on in-memory computing, yet we are also aware that there is still a way to go to make this database technology the single persistence store for the entire product family from SAP. So, personally for me… when thinking of SAP HANA there’s both a feeling of “yeah” as well as of “1.0 is the loneliest number” meaning “this is only the beginning!”

Let’s recap… SAP HANA was released into GA (General Availability) status on the 20th of June. Clarified upon the names and shortly after the documentation was out! At this year’s SAP TechEd in Las Vegas it was the most prominent topic of the event and in constant spotlight and critic alike (e.g. SAP Teched Las Vegas and Beyond – SAP at the Crossroads by Jon Reed.) One of the major points of critic I heard was that “Experience SAP HANA” wasn’t quite living up to what the name suggests: there was indeed plenty of information material and documentation, yet the test-drive aspect was not accessible to public at the beginning. According to Vishal Sikka, the SAP Mentors have been a driving force behind this notion and “got us to put [it] into high-gear“. Just this week the first people outside of SAP are able to access SAP HANA and judge for themselves (see Tweet by Jürgen Schmerder.)

Note: Speaking of whom, Jeff also published a very helpful guide(!) to all things SAP HANA over here: SAP HANA at SAPPHIRE Now & SAP TechEd Madrid. Very good overview for both business and technical tracks. Thanks for sharing!